Kathmandu December 19, 2008: The student wing, Nepal Students’ Union (NSU) affiliated with the Nepali Congress Party (Nepali congress is the opposition party of Nepal which is currently out of the coalition government) burnt a government’s car near Thapathali Engineering College (TEC) and vandalized two government motorcycles at the Pulchowk Engineering College (PEC) while showing agitation against the attack made by the All Nepal National Independent Students Union- Revolutionary (ANNISU-R) a student union wing of the Maoist on Friday. The students were demonstrating against the alleged attack on NSU activists by cadres of the Maoist-aligned Young Communist League (YCL) during their meeting with PEC officials on Thursday. During their protest, the students burnt tyres and blocked roads, bringing vehicular movement to a halt for hours. Police then fired teargas shells on the campus premises of TEC, Thapathali to disperse the agitating students but the student on the shell of the campus hurled stones at the police. At least more than two dozen students affiliated with NSU have been injured in the scuffle at PEC and TEC. The scuffle started on Thursday when both the Union’s of NSU and ANNISU-R had a tension at the PEC, Pulchowk. Pradip Paudel, President of NSU claimed, “ A group of armed YCL cadres attacked NSU activists while they were holding a meeting with college officials on Thursday and Later, they came to the campus hostel and attacked NSU activists." Paudel accused YCL members attacked NSU activist Bikas Sedain with khukuri and hurled stones at students on Friday while they were staging a demonstration in (PEC). Lekhnath Neupane President of ANISU-R denied mobilizing YCL activists to attack NSU cadres. He said Sedain had sustained a minor injury during a clash with ANNISU-R activists. Following the scuffle the PEC has announced indefinite closure of the college following the clashes between the students affiliated Unions. More likely, the normal students are bound to face the crises of involvement and consequence of politics in education, as student’s politics are directly related to the main stream politics. Moreover, the political parties play their games where the student’s union play the role of puppets where they are manipulated and used at the time of need and are dragged to suffer the consequences later. No matter what, politics in education is a dirty game which has been played for years by political parties but with the formation of new Nepal, this is the priority which needs to be resolved where education field and educational institution should be freed from any affiliation and politics is the voice of today. BY Shreedeep Rayamajhi
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